Obama and Afghanistan

I was supportive of removing all American troops from Afghanistan before Obama took office. I didn't think there was anything else we could accomplish. Bush had let it rot. Since that time, war president Barack Obama has killed Osama bin Laden-- the person responsible for 9/11, the reason for invading in the first place-- killed  Ilyas Kashmiri, the military brain of al Qaeda, and ordered a surge of troops to further secure the war zone and defeat the Taliban.

I don't believe I was wrong to oppose Obama's 2009 surge to send more troops.  He obviously knew more than I did and he obviously did exactly what he said he was going to do.  Had the president not refocused our efforts on the people who attacked us in 2001, there's no way we would have had the huge victories we've seen these last two months.  No way at all.

With tonight's apparent announcement that we are still going to have some 70,000 U.S. troops fighting in Afghanistan at the end of 2012, I gotta admit I still think it's the wrong decision.  I don't see any reason to still be there.  And I certainly can't comprehend spending hundreds of billions of tax payer dollars to fight Bush's war for one more day.

But that's just it.  The reason why President Obama has to keep troops there, has to keep spending huge amounts of money is because he is still cleaning up Bush's mess.  President Obama didn't inherit a simple situation in Afghanistan.  Heck he didn't inherit anything good at all from Bush's presidency.  The very reason why we still have to keep fighting and having our own troops killed in Afghanistan isn't because Barack Obama became president one day and decided it was time to fight a war.  It was because George Bush and the Republican Party failed miserably at waging war and securing America.  

How President Bush executed the war in Afghanistan was pitiful to say the least and criminal to be blunt.  What he gave to his successor was two endless wars and an economy on the verge of collapse.  No elected president has ever inherited such a disastrous situation. Complain all we want that we are still there and might be there for a few more years.  Just realize, however, this is something that should have been taken care of a long time ago.

Just like with the economy, President Obama still has to clean up the disaster Bush left for him in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Complain all you want, but what have you done for the war effort?